Afghanistan is a collaboration between photographer Chris Steele-Perkins and famed Afghan poet Sayd Bahodine Majrouh. In attempting to capture the continuing cycles of everyday life despite the country’s harsh reality of war, Steele-Perkins has created a celebration of Afghanistan, which he visited numerous times in the course of five years. "It was heroic, beautiful, violent, twisted, gracious, and tragic," Steele-Perkins explains. "The experience of being there works its way into one's being; an infection of the soul demanding that you return."

In all the different types of work I’ve done—editorial, travel, advertising—they’ve all had the same engine driving them, which is that I can’t think of anything that’s better than what happens in real life.